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-One of my best friends, Corey, moves away and I go from seeing him all the time to every three or four months or so and I don't mention it.
-I might be moving in with another of my best friends, Joe, in July and I don't mention it.
-My team, International Stinger, appears to be quietly falling apart because everyone is so much busier with other projects and I don't mention it.
-I'm running for an Executive Position at The Playground and I might win it (despite the fact that my rival candidate is my cartoonishly, over the top, arch enemy at the theater. My Lex Luthor. This guy harasses me online and just yesterday, I shit you not, wrote erotic, gay fan fiction about me. FOR THE SECOND TIME!!!) I think I might beat him, nonetheless, but I don't mention it here.
Well, enough of that.
I actually do have something that is sort of important to me and I want to discuss it a bit. And because of specific events from last night, my feelings on the matter are fresh and relevant. Here goes...
Last night, at the Playground, in the second slot of a four slot show, an improv team experienced a quiet bomb going off. It was a REALLY big deal for these guys and they may or may not recognize it today, but they grew in leaps and bounds last night. And all I did was control their lights and sounds for them.
This team, Speed Lemon, was in a very different place two months ago. They were over a year old. Had shed off a few members and were down to 6. They were cancelling rehearsals. And generally feeling bad about the entire experience. But like troopers, they were soldiering on.
The problem was, they were a bad fit with their coach. It was the coach that they were initially partnered with via the Playground Theater's Incubator process. A nice guy and an accomplished improviser on his own. He was, nonetheless, having trouble connecting with his team and sharing what he had learned with them. His particular process was more emo/actorly and while that's fine in moderation, he focused too much on that and didn't give them time to play and have fun. So much time spent examining their actual emotions. No time spent cutting loose and being silly. (You have to have both, or no progress can be made. Too much emo work? Bored, unhappy actors. Too much silly? Unfocused, sloppy work. Balance is key.)
So, that's where they were when one of the improvisers on the team approached me about how the theater could support them in changing coaches. I was, at the time, working as the theater's Incubator Liaison. That question was one of the central issues of my job. Supporting the Incubator teams, so that they could make this change without risking falling apart entirely or being without options. I gave the team my time and said, "If you vote, as a group, to make a change, I'll cover your rehearsals, acting as a temp coach, until you A.) complete a sit in process and increase your numbers and B.) try a few coaches and find the one that fits your work, the most." I was/and am currently, signed on to be their temp coach. That started on the first Sunday evening of April. Today is mid-may. Roughly 6 weeks since I stepped in as the temp coach.
My immediate vibe on the team is that they were a little shaken by the process of losing a coach and absolutely desperate to feel good about being on the team again. In the improv community, losing a coach, either by choice or by circumstance is a pretty big deal. Some teams never recover from it. For others, it's the beginning of a downward spiral that eventually breaks the team up. The individual players feel cast aside, unimportant and unloved as an ensemble. Adrift. Marked.
I know, because my first Incubator team, Swiss Family Robots, dealt with that twice. Our first coach, Becky, left us after a little over a year, to go produce her own original shows. Our second coach, Dave, worked with us for a just under a year and then moved to L.A. Both moves where good for them, but both were very difficult for the team. The second one broke us up entirely.
So, my first order of business was to begin relaxing and having fun with this team. To give them the safe enviroment where they could reconnect with the good parts of being on this particular ensemble and where they could feel free to express affection and respect for one another. I worked to create an enviroment where they were able to believe in themselves again. I reminded them that they are a year old as a group and as such, are well past the "getting to know you" phase. That they were ready for focus on form and performance and to begin performing like an older, advanced team. They were ready to hear this and began to believe it.
I noticed immediate improvement. Not to give the impression that things were bad when I walked in the door, they were just a little repressed and hesitant. Those guys shed those off immediately and began playing their asses off in rehearsal.
The smart, witty players hit the stage as hard a they could and played as hard as they could.
The supporters on the team jumped right in and explored that world with them.
Everyone began to bring their "A" game. And if we were playing a game, they really, really attacked the game and played it as hard as they could. Such smart, smart players. Waiting to be challenged. And to have their coach recognize when they nailed it and to encourage them when they headed in the "right" directions and to forgive them when they tripped up. In such ways, safe, productive enviroments are created in rehearsal.
They immediately located a very strong candidate for their sit in process. Meg brought wit and charm to the stage. She was attentive to the details of a shows imaginary world. She could immediately sense the game and heighten it. But best of all, she loved the work and she loved this team and her quiet offstage giggles endeared her to the cast.
They also brought in a new guy, Adam and a new girl, Roxanne. And with those additions, their numbers would become 9. Instead of 6. A solid, functioning, productive improv team. Both Adam and Roxanne are getting more and more confident, playing with the team and are acclimating well to where the group is headed, as an ensemble.
And they have a form. Their FIRST form. Up until now, without much guidance from the coach, they were just exploring montages and not feeling good about them. Their old coach didn't have much use for montages and silliness. So, he didn't bring them anything else to try. And they were adrift.
I brought them a game that I remembered from IO. A level 3 game that could VERY easily adapted to a 20 minute show. Longstoryshort: It's the creation of and the population of a small town, somewhere in the world. It forces the players to find their characters quickly and explore their rich lives together. And it allows for time skips forwards and backwards. Secrets. Lies. Hopes. Dreams. Etc. And this team's natural interest in vivid, interesting characters and their propensity for tying things up neatly, on their own, made me think that they would be a good fit with this form. And after a few rouch and tumble efforts to master it, they're making real progress with the form.
Which brings us to last night...
Their first performance of the new form, in front of a live audience.
We rehearsed the timing of the opening a few times, to get them used to the lights and sound elements that they added. At show time, I warmed them up and we had fun fooling around. We ran through the elements of the form, touching on the lessons that we'd learned about it, in rehearsal. (Less Conflict, More Gentle Kindness for one another, Listening. Making use of the location and these people's relationships to one another.)
They took the stage and we got the suggestion of a small town in Illinois. (Which taught me that we might need to tool with the opening question, a little bit and look for a location outside of IL.) Paul charmingly interviewed her a little bit about her town, while I searched for a song to begin with. I chose "Weapons of Deceit" from the Farhenheit 911 soundtrack. A simple instrumental that moves along at a decent clip and hints at something slightly nefarious lurking in the background. It's funny, but once I locked into that and I gave them their lights, the form took over and the show just happened.
The form has essentially four parts. The opening. The first Act of scenes (where we meet the characters and learn about them). The second act of scenes (where we see complications or enablements happening.) and the Closing Scene. (where some things get resolved and everyone appears once more to tie up loose ends and see where people's fates lead them.)
They nailed EVERY one of them.
The opening was smooth and they couldn't tell from the stage, but they looked SOOOOOOO good in those lights, with that sound behind them.
The first act was smart and interesting. They presented characters that all had very clear wants and needs. Some of them wanted to escape. Some of them wanted love. A lot of them expressed interest in one another, romantically. And the mayor told us that there would be some sort of Gala, at the end of the show.
The second act, romances were denied, identities were mistaken and one young boy expressed his fervent desire to get out of town and go somewhere remotely elsewhere.
In the third act, everyone geared up for the gala.
And in the final scene, they were AT the gala and we saw people coming together or being denied from one another. I kicked on the disco ball and romantic music and they danced together, in the dark light and then BLACKOUT on a good laugh line from Daflos.
And in such ways, does a team step quietly forth and say, "We have something to say, in an interesting way and we're going to present it for you, now." It's not often that you realize a team experiencing a milestone when it happens. But I immediately knew that this was a big deal for them.
Outside, we met up and discussed the show. I sensed that they were a little trepidatious. It wasn't the non-stop laugh riot that they're conditioned to accept as the mark of accomplishment. But I ran briefly through the show orders and showed them how their patient early scene work brought them to a really, really smart, subtle ending and finally shared with them the level of their accomplishment.
We're not there JUST to make people laugh. A baby can fart in the bathtub and THAT will make people laugh. Surely, as fully formed adults with life experience behind us and our masterful vocabularies to express them, we can offer something more to the audience. We are, in all honesty, storytellers and artists. We weave words to create a place and characters and a plotline, where before there was just a bare stage. We have the capabilities not just to entertain, but to enlighten and touch people at the core of their souls. And if we can, occasionally, reach that point, we are artists and our work is good and valid.
And that's what they touched upon, last night. They brought a coherent, sensible story to the stage. They started off by making promises to their audience with the lights and the sound and they delivered on it by gathering these highly separate threads and tying them all together so neatly, by the show's end.
By the end of the show, they WERE the advanced, smart, subtle players that I told them that they were, at the beginning of our process together. And that was with just a rudimentary, first stab at the form. Imagine how GOOD they can be, once they start OWNING this form for themselves and evolving it into something even better.
Anyways, I'm very, very proud of those guys today. I wasn't up there onstage with them. And I can't take credit for their accomplishment. In a business that's so ego oriented, it's a refreshing change to be a part of someone else's success, without stealing the spotlight from them. Today, I am proud of their work. And the amazing strides that they've made in just 6 short weeks. I couldn't be happier for them. For me, this has been an incredible learning experience. I can't wait to see where we go from here.
And now I've written about something that's sort of important to me...
Good Shows to You All,
Mr. B
1 comment:
with updates like this, who needs a phone call? I DO!!! xox miss you.
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